


change your mind

by shineyma



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-09
Updated: 2017-01-09
Packaged: 2018-09-15 22:58:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9261881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shineyma/pseuds/shineyma
Summary: Trey Harris is having a rough day.





	

There are three hallways between Trey and the elevators that brought him up to this floor (the fifteenth, as it happens). In those hallways are— _were_ , he’s been locked in this fucking room for _hours_ , there’s no telling what’s changed since he got ever-so-politely escorted in—fourteen doors, no windows, and twenty-seven people, all very carefully _not_ looking at him as he was walked past.

The number of doors and windows probably hasn’t changed. The people, though?

Twenty-seven people, each and every one of them armed. Some clumsily, uncomfortably—this is some kind of quasi-military installation, he thinks; maybe it’s protocol that everyone carry a weapon—but all armed.

And some of them _weren’t_ uncomfortable. Some of them wore their weapons openly, easily, and some had more than one. He caught glimpses of guns tucked into waistbands and knives hidden in boots.

They’re not soldiers, but they’re something like it. And the ones who were comfortable outnumbered the ones who weren’t. At least fifteen, with another four he’s not sure of.

Fifteen to nineteen people. Plus the two guards on the door. Three hallways, an elevator, fifteen floors. Then the heavily guarded lobby, the street outside, whatever car he can jack, and then—

—and then _what_? Go to the police? With his record, they wouldn’t give a damn. Probably either think he was lying or, if he was _really_ unlucky and word reached that asshole Stevenson, hand him right back to these people.

Too many variables, he decides—for the dozenth time since being left in this room. He doesn’t know enough, can’t control enough, to try and escape just yet.

So Trey slouches in his chair, props his boots (they let him keep them, though not the knife _or_ the lockpicking set hidden inside them) on the table, and waits.

And waits.

And _waits_.

He’s not alone the whole time. Someone brings him a bottle of water, someone else a magazine (fucking _Guns & Ammo_; they think they’re cute, don’t they?). Nobody makes eye contact. Nobody answers his questions.

There’s a logo stamped on the mirror (a one-way mirror, he’s pretty sure) across from him, a skull surrounded by tentacles. The longer he stares at it, the worse his headache gets. He’s starting to worry that whatever shit these people dosed him with did permanent damage.

But Trey knows better than to let on—that he’s hurting _or_ that he’s starting to get a little worried. So he closes his eyes, tips his head back, and feigns sleep.

Twenty minutes into his ‘nap’, the door opens again.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” his new visitor says. Trey cracks an eye open to look at him. Tall, well-armed…and he moves like a sniper. Every inch of him screams _threat_. “Your records were harder to find than we anticipated.”

“You could’ve asked,” Trey says mildly. He straightens a little in his chair, but doesn’t take his feet off the table.

His visitor doesn’t seem to care.

“Trey Harris,” the guy says, reading off the tablet he’s carrying. “36. Former US Marine—dishonorably discharged in 2015 after assaulting two superior officers. Risky move.”

“Worth it,” Trey assures him.

Trey’s—still unnamed, apparently rude—visitor scrolls through his tablet, eyebrows rising slowly. Maybe whatever file he’s got has pictures. Trey wonders if he’d let him see them if he asked. “Surprised you’re not in Leavenworth.”

So’s Trey, if he’s honest. But he’s usually not.

“I know a guy.”

“Uh huh.” The visitor—Trey decides to call him Ben, he looks like a Ben—continues to scroll. “You teach self-defense at the Y?”

Ben’s tone is pretty bland, but Trey still somehow gets the impression he’s surprised. Like, really surprised. Astonished, even.

Trey might be a little insulted, actually.

“Are you planning on reading me my life story,” he asks, “or are you gonna tell me what the hell it is you want with me?”

There’s something wry in the curve of Ben’s smile. “Funny you should ask—”

Why it’s funny, Trey doesn’t get to find out. There’s a brief knock at the door, and then one of the guards opens it and sticks her head in.

“Sorry, Director,” she says, grimacing, “but we just got a call from 42.”

Ben closes his eyes. “Don’t tell me.”

“She’s on her way,” the guard says. “Should we—?”

“Let her in,” Ben orders.

“Yes, sir,” the guard says, plainly relieved.

The door closes. Trey looks at Ben. Ben looks at Trey.

“Well?” Trey prompts.

“Just wait,” Ben advises. His face is blank, but Trey reads exhaustion in his posture as he leans back against the mirror. Part of him notes it as an advantage, an opening to be taken, and that part of him urges him to keep prodding, to poke at the edges and see what he gets, whether Ben can be provoked into lowering his guard long enough for Trey to overpower him.

Another part of him is moved to pity, and for whatever reason, that’s the part that wins out.

In any case, Trey doesn’t have to wait long. It’s only a few minutes before the door bursts open to admit another visitor—presumably the _her_ Ben said should be allowed in.

Whoever she is, she’s gorgeous.

And she’s completely focused on Trey.

“You found him,” she breathes. She’s got an accent—English, of the rich and/or well-educated variety.

“We found Trey Harris,” Ben says. It sounds like he’s correcting her, but if she didn’t mean Trey, who did she _think_ he was? “Former Marine. Born in Pennsylvania. He’s got a record.”

The woman breaks Trey’s gaze to frown at Ben. “Excuse me?”

“Repin went over everything we found with a fine-tooth comb,” he says, passing her his tablet. “It looks legit.”

She barely glances at the tablet before passing it back. “Daisy’s work. Of course it’s credible. Give Repin a few hours, I’m sure she’ll find the cracks. This is _him_ , Markham. You know it as well as I do.”

“Ma’am—”

Since waking up this morning, Trey’s been abducted from his own apartment, knocked out, and locked in a tiny room for at _least_ seven hours. He has no idea who these people are or what they want, but he’s really damn sick of waiting to find out.

“Look, I don’t know who the fuck you think I am, but you’re definitely wrong,” he says, swinging his feet off the table to sit forward. “My life looks legit because it _is_.”

It earns him a pitying look, but not much else—which, to be honest, he kind of expected. No way these people are just gonna let him go after all this; they’ve got _criminal_ written all over them. Even once they’re convinced he’s not this mysterious _him_ they’ve mistaken him for, they’re much more likely to kill him than just take him nicely back to his apartment.

It’s time to consider his options.

The woman might be gorgeous, but she’s tiny; Trey’s got nearly a foot on her. And she’s wearing a lab coat and leaving her side wide open, which suggests that her role in this freak show is brains, not brawn. She’s not even carrying a weapon that he can see.

And Ben—Markham, that is—just called her ma’am. So she’s got rank.

In short, she’s the perfect hostage. All he needs is for her to get close enough to grab.

Good news: she gets real close, real fast.

Bad news: she plops right down in his lap, and he’s too stunned to do any grabbing before Markham’s moved closer, too. Not a _lot_ closer, but enough so that he’ll be able to intervene if Trey tries anything. If they were standing it’d be one thing, but with both of them in this chair—

Fuck.

On the bright side, he’s got a very attractive woman in his lap. That’s something.

“Poor thing,” said woman murmurs. Her hands cup his face, then slide up into his hair to massage his temples like she knows about the headache that’s been pounding at them for hours. “You’re very confused, aren’t you? And no one’s told you anything at all.”

“No,” he agrees. Her fingers are cold, and the gentle circles they’re tracing, combined with her weight in his lap…well, he’s gonna have a problem on his hands real soon if she keeps it up. “They haven’t.”

“Hmm.” This close, she looks—well, still gorgeous, but also tired. There are dark circles under her eyes and a certain tightness to her mouth that speaks of stress. “Well, allow me to explain. My name is Jemma Ward and _you_ —” she leans in close, one hand falling to cover his heart “—are my husband.”

…Why are the hot ones always crazy?

“You don’t believe me,” Jemma Ward says, even as he scrambles for a response to that. “I understand. The people who _stole_ you from me tampered with your mind, implanted false memories to hide the truth.”

She might be talking nonsense, but damn if the cold fury written all over her face doesn’t suit her. He almost wishes he could play along; pretending to be somebody else might be worth it if it got him her.

But that’s just his libido talking. Putting aside the fact that he’s got an entire life he’s not in a hurry to walk away from, it sounds like Jemma’s got a _real_ husband out there somewhere, and if the people he surrounds himself with are any indication, he’s probably a pretty dangerous guy.

Trey’s faced off against more than one angry husband in his time. It’s the kind of trouble he’s learned not to invite.

“Look,” he starts—only to be immediately silenced when Jemma presses a finger to his lips.

“You don’t believe me,” she repeats. “There are a number of ways I could prove it to you—for one thing, I assure you I know how to touch you much, much better than any _floozy_ you’ve slept with in the past year could ever hope to—”

“I’m not against that method,” he says before he can stop himself. Her finger’s still resting lightly against his mouth; it’s hell on his self-control.

“No.” Jemma smiles. “I don’t imagine you are.”

She shifts slightly in his lap—not to do anything, he doesn’t think, just making herself more comfortable—and he hisses in a breath.

Her smile fades.

“I could list every scar,” she says, “every mole. I know every _inch_ of you—Trey, was it?” One of her hands has found its way to the nape of his neck to toy with the hair there, and when he nods, her fingers curl in just so. The scratch of her nails against _that_ spot sparks an electric current straight to his cock. “I know how you like to be touched…and how you like to touch _me_.”

Trey barely recognizes his own voice when he asks, “Do you?”

This is ridiculous. He’s not some fumbling virgin—hell, he’s the furthest thing from it. When he was still in the Corps, he talked his way into the beds of some of the most devoted and faithful married women on base. It takes more than a beautiful woman and a few touches to get him this wound up.

What the hell is going on here?

“Oh, yes,” Jemma says softly. “Would you like to hear about it? Hm? Perhaps I could show you our bed, give you a demonstration—”

Markham—and fuck, Trey’d totally forgotten him—coughs. Jemma sighs.

“No, I suppose not.” She tips her head, then smiles slightly. “Still, a little taste couldn’t hurt.”

Then she’s kissing him, and Trey forgets Markham all over again. He also forgets his headache, the indignity of being kidnapped, his annoyance—everything.

All that matters is Jemma, the heat of her, the _taste_ of her, her nails in his scalp and her soft curves under his hands. He needs more of her—hell, he just _needs_ her, period.

He’s thinking of the table right behind her—thinking of laying her across it, stripping her out of that lab coat and learning every inch of _her_ the way she claims to know every inch of him—when she breaks the kiss. She’s flushed and breathless and one kiss is nowhere near enough, it’s barely even a _start_ , so he drags her back in and kisses his way down the side of her neck, enjoying her squirming and the way her breath catches when he bites down just so—

And then her gasped “ _Grant_ ” hits him like a bucket of ice water.

Right.

She thinks he’s someone else.

He sits back in his chair, pushing aside the hot and angry something curling beneath his skin. This is nothing. _She’s_ nothing. Just some hot, crazy woman who’s deluded herself into believing he’s her husband. Probably he should feel sorry for her.

“Ahem,” Jemma says, carefully smoothing her hair. “Yes. As I was saying…”

She falters, looking almost lost, and behind her, Markham says, “You’re not gonna prove it to him.”

“Right! Yes, thank you, Markham.” She cups Trey’s jaw to give him a swift, chaste kiss and then stands. “I _could_ prove it to you, but I won’t. Because proving isn’t enough, you see.”

The lost look is gone from her face, replaced with steely determination. It’s not unattractive—in other circumstances, he’d even call it sexy—but for some reason, it sets his nerves on edge.

“I don’t just want you to believe you’re my husband,” she says. “I want you to _know_ it. I want you to _be_ him. I—”

She stops, shakes her head, and rounds the table, heading for the door. Trey remembers the whole hostage-taking plan too late; she’s already far out of reach, heading for the door. Once there, she pauses and turns back to meet his eyes.

“I’m going to bring you back,” she tells him. “It’s going to hurt, and I _am_ sorry for that. But the real you is in there somewhere and I—” Her lips thin. “I’m going to bring you back. You’ll see.”

He…really doesn’t like the sound of that. “You’ve got the wrong guy, Jemma. I’m not Grant.”

“At the moment? No, you’re not. But you were before and you will be again. I’ll make sure of it.” She squares her shoulders and opens the door, tossing a careless, “Take him to my lab” at Markham like an afterthought.

Trey shoots to his feet, but he only just has time to register the gun (no, not a gun, but something like it) before Markham pulls the trigger, and then—nothing.


End file.
